Over the past couple of years I’ve scaled back my trips to Boston. Part of it was due to work, part to the desire to stay closer to home, and part of it was simple laziness. Life gets in the way, as some New Age philosophy goes. (Is it really a New Age at this point? When does it become Old Age? Because I think we’re there.) But back to Boston, quite literally. Though I didn’t spend my entire childhood there, I spent a few key childhood moments in the city, and then I spent the formative years of my late teens and early twenties there, which made me into the man I’ve somehow become, for better or worse. Every time I’m there, I feel a bit more grounded. It was where I had been lost, and where I had found myself. That’s something you have to do alone.
Often, I was there in solitude, yet rarely did I feel lonely. The condo was my companion, and the city twinkled outside its windows, ready and waiting for when and if I wanted to play. When the weather turns I will feel its pull again, although even in the most unwelcoming atmospheric conditions, Boston somehow manages to thrill. Sometimes it’s even better when the outside world wails, and inside the condo is a cozy respite from the meteorological and emotional mayhem of a rough winter.
As I write this, an early spring songbird trills an unexpected and not unwelcome string of notes. It feels slightly out of place with so much winter yet to go, but we’re on the right track. There’s less than a month of this shit to go. Boston beckons… and I hear the call.
